


Such a Warm Machine

by Ghanima_Starkiller



Category: Terminator (Movies), Terminator - All Media Types, Terminator Salvation (2009)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-13
Updated: 2013-03-13
Packaged: 2017-12-05 05:11:07
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,383
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/719234
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ghanima_Starkiller/pseuds/Ghanima_Starkiller
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John and Kate share a quiet moment in the midst of war</p>
            </blockquote>





	Such a Warm Machine

John glances up from the cot where he lays toward where the last rays of the sickly orange sun are bleeding through the thin, rectangular opening, the flap of canvas that serves as a door to the infirmary tent. Kate stands there, caught in the fading daylight, her hair set ablaze, and it isn’t fire that he thinks of but that now extinct sight of a rose in bloom, the feminine curves of the petals. Her coverall is unbuttoned to the breast and she’s toying with the collar, inadvertently tugging the drab fabric so that he can see the pale swell of her bosom, clothed only by the gauzy white of her tank top.

They don’t get many quiet moments these days. When had they ever? He can’t even remember the last time he just looked at her like this, caught her off her guard. Her green eyes are cast outward, at the barren terrain, and he thinks they look faraway, thoughtful. He wonders what’s going through her mind. He intuits a lot—with Kate it’s always been so easy, which is why they have always fit together so effortlessly—but he wants to know now, what’s to hear her say it.

And as if she understands this, as if she heard his silent question as clearly as if he’d spoken aloud, she replies, the soft sound of her voice startling him momentarily, unaware that she’d even known he was awake. “They take it piece by piece, don’t they?” she murmurs, and her breath stirs the motes of dust caught in the bleeding light of the sunset, making them swirl and dance like clouds of smoke. “We don’t mean them to; we fight to stop it. But we… adapt. And that adaptation is chipping away at it, our humanity.” She tilts her head to the side, the dust following her movement as the shadows glide and adjust to her face.

He grunts a laugh as he struggles to sit up, swinging his legs over the edge of the cot and leaning over, propping one good arm on his knee, the other stiff with healing; the entire left side of his body is unyielding and sore. “You sound like me,” he observes.

A short burst of a chuckle escapes her full, parted lips, a gentle sort of a scoff. “There’s no romance left in the world, John,” she continues, not cheerlessly; it’s matter-of-fact, almost—very almost—playful. He understands immediately what she’s saying, and his eyes fall to the floor, packed dirt and nothing more; her own follow. He can’t remember the last time they were fully unclothed together, when it wasn’t quick and desperate.

Because it’s not just the idea that they might be interrupted, that they have to be fast about it and get on with life, such as it was, running and hiding, before the machines caught them and killed them all; it was the idea that you may die at any moment. It made you impulsive, frantic almost, for life, for some sort of affirmation of the goodness in what they were doing. By grasping at humanity, Kate was telling him, they were losing small portions of it.

He reaches a hand out to her and, smiling, she moves forward to take it, her hair flaring one last time before she slid into the musty dimness of the tent. “You’re still hurt,” she notes, running the slender fingers of her other hand along his left shoulder.

“All the more reason to take it slowly,” he mutters, his voice a low rumble, as compelling, as commanding as ever but… gentle, soothing. He wraps his injured arm around her waist, grimacing at the tender tautness of his muscles. She almost pulls away then, her expression that of his medic not his wife, protesting wordlessly. But he smiles and it’s communicable, because she’s grinning as well, chuckling at herself, at him, as she shakes her head.

“You’re doctor wouldn’t approve of this,” she tells him, taking his face in her hands and kissing his mouth, long, lingeringly. “But your wife would like you to know that you’re incorrigible.”

“Always,” he growls against her lips. He undresses her unhurriedly, his left hand fumbling, neither of them caring. She has freckles on her shoulders; they get darker the tanner she gets and turn from a pinkish color to a light brown. He loves each one of them, knows them by heart, he realizes. She has a small smattering on her breastbone, where she’s got a red burn in the shape of her coveralls neckline and where he now presses his mouth. Her freckles are flushed there, and the rest of her is pale.

His own skin his rough like leather and nearly the same color. She had washed away the dust and grit when she patched him up, but it’s returning; it just always keeps returning. It sticks in the fine glistening of his sweat, and he’s now covered in a thin sheen, and gets under her fingernails as she rakes them against his shoulders as he bows his head, taking one rosy nipple into the warm, wet embrace of his lips, and then the other. His short, bristly hair brushes her skin, her throat and the underside of her chin, her shoulder, making her shudder and wriggle, moan and giggle.

She’s straddling his lap, feeling how hard this deliberate pace is making him, pressing into the softness between her thighs, where she’s becoming slicker, hotter, nearly achingly ready for him. His lips make quiet smacking noises against her flesh, the places he’s tasting turning a dusky, blushing color, almost like a bruise; his mark, the temporary brand of his desire.

It’s difficult to maneuver on the rigid, narrow cot, let alone be romantic, but they both attempt it nevertheless. He dips his head between her legs, lapping at the milk white skin of her thighs, of her lower belly, before his tongue dives into her in the most intimate sort of kiss. She’s huffing and panting by the time he sits up, pulling her atop him again, half-reclining as his cock glides into her. The resistance is slight and familiar but creating just enough friction to excite them both anyway. She sees a flicker of the whites of his eyes for a moment, fluttering beneath his half-lidded, dark lashes as she grips him and he begins to move, to push and to thrust.

There’s desperation now, but not in that same, typical sense; this is a natural and thrilling need for release. She can feel him shuddering as his penetrations become more and more frenetic, holding back the flood with a self-restraint that is quickly crumbling. She cries out as she comes, and John is only a moment behind her, his seed a heated and sticky rush within her silken, clenching insides. For a moment, he feels as if he’s going deeper than he had ever been before, sucked down into the depths of her, sultry and comforting.

His body is solid, the taut physique of a soldier, and Kate finds herself wondering at how restful it is to lie against him nevertheless, snug and cozy; likewise, he marvels at how supple her body has remained, and how she molds herself against him as if they were always meant to fit together. This is it, they both understand: their moment, one that might not come again for a very long time. They kiss; her mouth gently runs along the puckered threads of his many scars, some fresher than others, some she has just sewn up only hours ago. And she realizes that this is human, to be grateful for the things like this, no matter how small or short lived.

She even believes they’ll be allowed to doze like that for a while, but a commotion brings John to his feet pulling his pants on. Without thought or question, she helps him draw a shirt down over his arms; instinct more than habit. Love. He kisses her one last time, passionately, as if it may be the last time as always, and leaves.

Evening had fallen and the tent was filled with purple dusk, the dust settling into the shadows. She smiled a little, thinking, ‘Dust settles.’ Maybe not today, or tomorrow, but always.


End file.
